The Sad Situation with Our Bees

Now that it's over, I suspect that I am feeling much like someone who has lost a pregnancy.
For the bees, at least the lucky ones, it may have been the rapture, but I am filled with a sense of loss and emptiness.

Over the decades we've lived here on the hill we have been hosts to several unwanted bee hives, always on a warm, east-facing site.  One was in the crawl space under our bedroom,  two were in the walls of the guest house.  Those unlucky hives had to be destroyed.  Some were swarms that moved out on their own in in due time, but this particular group decided to take up residency in some wooden boards leaned up against an inside shed wall of the barn.  For a long time we judiciously let them be (NPI), they weren't hurting anyone, it was wonderful to have them pollinating our plants, and we both grew to like the idea of keeping them around.

We read articles on bees and bee keeping, watched videos and movies, read blogs and became very excited about the idea of becoming backyard beekeepers.  Visions of honey comb and happy hives buzzed in our heads.

But the more we read and learned, the more complicated, difficult, physically demanding and potentially expensive the enterprise seemed to become.  Even though we found one beekeeper who said he could remove the bees from the barn wall and put them in a hive for us to keep, we finally elected to have them moved to another property when we learned that we would soon be hosting kids and seven small grand children.

So, Michael donned his fire fighter turnouts (below) and spent some time clearing out a path for Shawn, the bee man.

 

Yesterday morning, when the fog had lifted, Shawn arrived with all of his gear.   I sat in the sun and waited at what I hoped was a respectful distance while he donned his gear, hauled equipment, lugged more junk out of his way, and finally brought in his bee vac with attached hive carrying case (on the red can in the foreground).

 

It was very cool - but stressful.The bees had been very calm around us, but they could feel quite differently about someone raiding their honey come, destroying their hive, and sucking them up with a vacuum.  If they were Africanized, they could be REALLY upset.  But they weren't.  And he said it was a very healthy hive, with lots of honey.

The bees were (relatively) calm and  Shawn was calm, deliberate and patient, and eventually had a good portion of the bees in his box, and three nice chunks of golden honey comb in Tupperware for us to keep.

As delighted as I was with the honeycomb, and even though I was relieved to see that potential tot danger alleviated,  it was very sad to see them go.  After two hours of painstaking work, Shawn held up his little box and said, "Well?  Here's your bees, say goodbye."

 I miss them.  I just know they would have been wonderful bees.

ADD Without the H

I seem to have started a hundred projects, then run in circles trying to complete just one.  It's the hot, muggy middle of August, yet these days feel anything but lazy!

A gallon of milk sat too long in the fridge, so I found a recipe for making paneer and spent a few failed tries to achieve a wonderful little cheese!



I learned that:

1. You have to really heat the milk, not just warm it. 
2. It takes some time.
3. You don't need to add anything except lemon juice.  
4. It is as easy as falling down.
5. The result is delicious!
6. You can't really make ricotta from the leftover whey (or at least I couldn't).  

In fact, I don't know what you can do with it: it tasted lousy when used to make rice, and even the dogs turned their noses up at it.

Next and continuously (but not at the same time nor in the same bowls) was washing and dyeing fleece and fiber for Pluckyfluff's Yarnival event next week in Placerville (poster is here), and for other upcoming events in the fall.  The Yarnival is on Boeger Winery's grounds, and should be amazing fun, but work for Mikey since he has agreed (I think) to man the booth while I take a workshop on Saturday and Sunday.  Do you believe this progression?

Of course, the whole thing was on a much larger scale, involving two washing machines, the entire kitchen in the guest house/studio, and most of the week.  But what a lot to show for it!

 Dyes mixed and waiting -- my favorites.
 The simmering pot -- great expectations.

The rack rolls inside at night and stays out on the deck during the day.  Very convenient.

Woolllama, mohair and wool and even some ?????

The roving is a riot of color.

Another Peaceful Day

 

San Diego has the most amazing weather, and this year has beat all records for mildness.  We have yet to experience a "real" summer, and by that I mean days that are scorchers with temps in triple digits and humidity in singles, for days on end.  Instead, we have had the cooling marine layer in the morning, followed by sun mid-day, a pleasant sunset, and then cool, foggy nights.  Everyone has been sheared for the warm weather, so most of the critters spend the day hanging out in the shade.  Here (above) two of the buck goats watch as Rizado reaches for some tempting pecan leaves.  Lani has her usual "huh" expression.



 
Dusty has picked up on the slight commotion and moseys over to see if he can grab the branch.  He is taller, and - as expected - managed to connect (below), pulling the branch down so that Rizado can grab a bite, and the goats can hoover-up any stray leaves.


Eventually the tiniest llama, Lilly,  shows up to see if there is any left for her, but too late - Dusty has let go, and everyone else has to wait and wish.

Fresh Fleeces

Whew!

Finally finished the two dozen fleeces, updated the spreadsheet, and - I think! - have things back in the trailer in a more-or-less organized fashion.  I am washing mohair fleeces to send off to Morro Bay for processing into roving, ditto the black Wensleydale lambs' fleeces.  Then there is another box of wool and alpaca to go to Zeilingers for socks, but that is on hold for the moment until they have more room on their waiting list.  Last are the black and gray fine wool fleeces (and coordinating llama fleeces), which are waiting for me to decide between roving or socks or ???

Everything else is on the inventory.  Well, except for 10 llama, which I will attack later.

Sleeping Arrangements

For cats and dogs alike, the most sought-out place to sleep is in our bedroom.  When the sheep guardians get the day off, they high-tail it through the doggy door, often causing a dog-jam and blocking each other in the hallway, then race to the doggy bed that graces a corner of our bedroom.

 

There is only room for one of the beasts, so the one who comes in second has to content herself with the rug and maybe a corner of the blanket.  There they snore the day away until dinner time.

Yollie (the goat guardian) is the bed's occupant at night because a neighbor complained about her howling at coyotes and sirens.  So she comes in after dark.  Every now and then she gets a little competetion from Sheba (As In Queen Of) the cat.

 

Sheba came to us as a barely domesticated youngster who was never told about boundaries, so she  knows virtually none.  She got to the bed first, therefore it was hers.  

 

Unfortunately, Yollie didn't see it that way:

Yollie came in, made her usual circular pass of the cushion, then gently plopped down in her traditional spot.  Sheba let out sort of a squished squeak, but didn't move.  She just looked at me with that, "So, what do you intend to do about this?" look.  When I just went for the camera, she eventually gave up and disgustedly hauled herself out from under the dog.

For a while her favorite place was outside on a deck chair or inside on a chest:

We'll see how long that lasts.

"Even the least among them..."

While I am an abject atheist, sometimes those quotes just pop up in my head.  Guess that's what a dozen years of intense Sunday school and bible teaching will do to a person.  Anyway, we finally got around to shearing Mouse.  Mouse will be a year old in September, but is the mini-est of Pygoras due to being premature.

I did not want to take the risk of subjecting him to Rodney's abattoir-shearing techniques, so one day when I felt particularly brave, we steeled ourselves for the job.

 Here he comes!

 We are NOT pleased.

Are we done yet?

Sadly, his fleece was so fine that it had already started to felt, but I saved it anyway.  Might make a nice felted toy?  Maybe next time will be better -- for all of us. 

The Next Step

The last bit on shearing was written in May of this year.  It has taken me this long to work up the gizzards to go out and see what sort of sorry mess awaited me in the "wool vault."  The "vault" is actually a small, ancient travel trailer with beds modified into wide shelves for fiber storage.  Once every few months I seal it up and bomb for bugs, which helps to save the fiber from moths until I can deal with it.  When I opened the door, this is the amazing sight that confronted me:

 

Wool, llama, mohair and alpaca: floor to ceiling, wall to wall.  With the help of my ever-faithful companion, partner and spouse, we eventually managed to take everything out and sort the bags into piles on several tarps.

The trailer looks beautiful:

But now comes the hard part: deciding what to DO with all of it and putting the fiber back in!